ARS | Publication request: VALIDATION OF AN LCTA-COMPATIBLE APPROACH TO MILITARY LAND MONITORING

Submitted to: Meeting Abstract
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: April 1, 2003
Publication Date: August 18, 2003
Citation: HERRICK, J.E., REISER, M.H., MYERS, L.M., HAVSTAD, K.M. VALIDATION OF AN LCTA-COMPATIBLE APPROACH TO MILITARY LAND MONITORING. 12TH ANNUAL ITAM WORKSHOP. 2003. ABSTRACT P. 72.

Technical Abstract: A recently developed integrated soil and vegetation rangeland monitoring protocol for arid and semiarid grasslands, shrublands and savanna ecosystems has been adapted to generate LCTA-compatible data while generating additional soil and vegetation indicators that are more sensitive to changes in ecosystem function. The sampling design is also more compatible with remote sensing data. In this presentation, we present the results of three experiments: (1) a comparison between standard LCTA methods and the new protocol in several plant communities in southern New Mexico, (2) a series of studies in which the new indicators are calibrated with more intensive measurements, and (3) an experiment designed to determine the number of measurements required to detect differences with specified alpha and beta at both plot and landscape scales in different plant communities. The results indicate that a much broader suite of functions can be monitored with a relatively small increase in time cost over traditional LCTA measurements while maintaining compatibility with existing datasets.